


Ornaments

by haunt_the_stars



Category: Batman (Comics)
Genre: Angst, Bruce Wayne is a Good Parent, Christmas, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Father-Son Relationship, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, whats a timeline i made one up
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-28
Updated: 2018-12-28
Packaged: 2019-09-29 01:06:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,851
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17193614
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/haunt_the_stars/pseuds/haunt_the_stars
Summary: It's Jason's first Christmas with the family again and Bruce just doesn't want to mess anything up. Too bad things are pretty messed up to begin with when you've, y'know, died.





	Ornaments

**Author's Note:**

  * For [starknjarvis](https://archiveofourown.org/users/starknjarvis/gifts).



> Written for the 2018 Gen Batfam Christmas Stocking for starknjarvis27 / cylobaby27 's prompts "A seemingly normal holiday activity accidentally makes someone sad, someone else comforts them." and "Jason's first Christmas back at the manor."
> 
> Hey pal! Hope you had a lovely holiday! This is a little rushed and a lot unedited but I hope you enjoy some nice Jason & Bruce content and some other lil batkid vignettes.

Every once in a while, Bruce wondered what it was like to have five mostly-grown children in a normal-sized house. Usually, he immediately wished he didn’t wonder about it, because the idea was terrifying. His family not being able to spread out to their own spaces...it would be awful for everyone except perhaps Dick. Even he sometimes retreated for a few hours, and Bruce would find him under a heavy blanket, headphones in, happily shutting the world out.

 

It was one of those times, when everyone was shutting the world out in their own way. As of this morning, all five of his kids were under his roof, and they would be having Christmas Eve dinner all together in about nine hours. Then Christmas Eve patrol, when Nightwing wore colorful string lights and Red Robin wore a Santa hat and Orphan’s humming of Christmas songs was constant on the comms. But for now, in anticipation of spending so much time together and so much energy trying not to kill each other, they were taking a few hours for themselves.

 

Bruce checked on Cassandra first, found her curled up with a tablet in the library watching what he had to assume was the holiday baking show she’d been watching so much lately.  _ It’s relaxing,  _ she’d told him. Ace sat on her feet, tail thumping against the chair. Cass waved at Bruce, not bothering to take her headphones out, then signed, “Do you need help?” Bruce shook his head, smiled, and waved back before quietly shutting the door and moving on.

 

Damian was harder to find, but Bruce eventually discovered him perched on a window seat in the study, fast asleep, sketchbook and a handful of pencils in his lap. Bruce smiled at the sketch of the large tree that stood outside the window. Damian had captured the falling snow, and seemed to have started adding a small bird with a tiny scarf before he fell asleep. Bruce gently moved the book and pencils to a table and replaced them with a blanket over Damian, hoping the chill from the window wouldn’t freeze him. 

 

Dick was next, and Bruce didn’t even have to walk far into his bedroom before he heard the shower running and Dick’s voice drifting out of the bathroom with the steam. Bruce listened for a few seconds, thinking wistfully to himself how nice it would be if he actually remembered how to play the piano so he could share in Dick’s love of music. Damian had just started letting Dick teach him how to play the guitar, and Bruce would be lying if he said he wasn’t just the tiniest bit jealous of yet another connection they had that didn’t involve him.

 

He moved on down the hall to Tim’s room, and got another auditory confirmation of wellbeing in the form of Tim’s bright giggles, and then a, “It’s definitely just ‘moose,’ Bart.” A pause, then, “Well,  _ house  _ rhymes with  _ mouse  _ but it’s  _ houses _ , not  _ hice _ , right?” and then, “Kon, shut up,” and then more laughter, which made Bruce’s heart warm. He ignored the fact that the giggles were probably due to Tim’s obvious crush on Superboy, because to acknowledge it would be to acknowledge that yet another son of his had a thing for men who could bench press him. He had lost enough sleep over Dick, and Tim had his own contingency plans. Probably.

 

Bruce considered stopping his rounds there to avoid agitating his most volatile child. He had seen him just an hour or two ago, and it was unlikely that anything life-shattering had happened in the meantime. But a worried little drive always seemed to win over in situations like this. He couldn’t relax until each bird was accounted for, and after spending so long not getting to check on Jason, it was a privilege he never wanted to pass up. Especially today, given the circumstances.

 

All five birds in his nest for Christmas...for the first time.

 

True, each year had brought them a little closer to it, with Jason first sneaking in during the night to drop some mania-driven notes and presents, then the next year coming for an awkward visit during breakfast, and finally this year, a hesitant  _ maybe  _ to Alfred’s invitation. Truthfully, Bruce didn’t think he would come. His visits were slightly more frequent than they used to be, slightly more peaceful, and Bruce knew that he and Dick had a standing monthly dinner date, that he and Tim were steadfast video game partners, and that he genuinely seemed to like Cass and Damian. But when it came to Bruce, everything was still a battle.

 

He was sort of hoping for a Christmas miracle come dinner time tonight, that maybe they’d get through a whole twenty-four hours without conflict.

 

The room that had unofficially become Jason’s was empty, as was his childhood bedroom -- expected, since Jason usually wanted nothing to do with it. Bruce would have checked the library next, but he had been in there to see Cass and Jason wasn’t with her. Alfred was unaccompanied in the kitchen, putting a sheet of sugar cookies into the oven, and reported that he hadn’t seen Jason any more recently than Bruce had.

 

Beginning to worry, Bruce was about to make his way back to the study to check down in the cave when he heard the faintest of sniffles.

 

_ Oh no. _

 

He stepped silently backwards until he could pinpoint the noise that was coming from the sitting room. It was quiet, but unmistakably Jason. Bruce could pick out the sound of any of his kids’ tears from a mile away, even if some of them were more apt to let him hear than others. He had to come up with a game plan, though. Dick and Cassandra both liked to be held when they were upset, while Damian usually calmed down with verbal reassurances and Tim was content to have someone sit with him and listen. 

 

When Jason was young, he used to like Bruce to sit and listen to him too. But sometimes when he looked at his son now, it was like looking at a stranger. So different in the ways he talked and moved and felt that Bruce didn’t know how to take care of him, didn’t know how to love him anymore. 

 

But he had to try.

 

Bruce came around the corner into the sitting room to see Jason sitting, legs crossed, face buried in his hands, under the Christmas tree. There were at least twenty Christmas trees in Wayne Manor, most of them in the front entryway and the ballroom, but those were decorated with big, plain, shining balls. The eight-foot beast in the sitting room was for all the ornaments each of his children had collected over the years, from the very first little elephant he’d given a nine-year-old Dick to Damian’s new tiny tray of teacups. Jason, despite his huge and intimidating stature, looked small beneath it.

 

“Jason.” 

 

Jason started, lifted his head, and groaned. His voice was brittle and his face was red. “How much would it cost for you to go away?”

 

“I’m a billionaire.”

 

Jason huffed, rubbing his eyes with his sleeve, and Bruce stepped further into the room, doing his best to look open and non-threatening. Open palms. Loose arms. Just like Cassandra taught him. “Do you want to talk about it?”

 

“Nope,” Jason said. Bruce shrugged, and sat down next to him, keeping just a bit of distance between their shoulders. Letting Jason come to him.

 

_ Praying Jason came to him. _

 

“It’s not  _ fair _ ,” came Jason’s pitiful whisper after nearly a minute.

 

Bruce resisted the urge to turn and face him, hoping he’d feel more comfortable this way. “No, it’s not.”

 

“You don’t even know what I’m talking about.”   
  


“It’s probably not fair.”

 

A startled, choked half-laugh came from Jason, and then a hand was in front of Bruce’s face, uncurling to reveal an ornament. One of the first ornaments he gave Jason, in the shape of a tire.

 

It had seemed funny at the time.

 

“I was thirteen, when you got me this,” Jason says, and Bruce nods patiently. “And that was seven years ago. I’m twenty.”

 

Bruce had a bit of a feeling he knew where this was going, but he nodded again. “Yes, you are.”

 

“I’ve only been...a-alive, and...sane, for...sixteen years, total.” 

 

Now Bruce did look over, saw Jason shudder and another tear slip down his cheek. “I missed so much. I missed getting my license, and my prom, and my graduation and birthdays and I’m here fucking crying because I missed getting some _stupid_ _fucking ornaments_.”

 

Bruce felt his heart sink. “Jay…”

 

He had nothing else to say. Jason’s lip quivered and his breathing stuttered, tears coming in a slow trickle as he collapsed forward into his hands again. “I’m not twenty yet, Bruce. I can’t be twenty. I can’t be twenty when I was never sixteen or seventeen or--”

 

“Shh.” Carefully, Bruce laid a hand on his son’s back and rubbed up and down his spine. He wasn’t sure how well a hug would be received yet. But maybe this could be a compromise. “You don’t have to be twenty. You can be sixteen if you want.”

 

“I can’t be s-sixteen.”

 

“Why can’t you?”

 

Jason looked up at him like it was the most obvious thing in the world. “I can’t be  _ younger  _ than  _ Tim _ .” 

 

That was another thing about Jason. No matter the circumstance, no matter if they were sitting on the floor and Jason was crying, there was no one that could ever make him laugh more.

 

For a few seconds, Bruce felt horror crawl up his spine as he let out the most inappropriate, uncontrollable laugh he had in years. A rare “bat-guffaw,” as Dick would call it. Jason stared, wide-eyed, shocked into breathing steady again.

 

And then he laughed too.

 

Bruce hadn’t really heard Jason laugh since he came back with an adult voice. He’d heard him cackle, heard him mock him, but never  _ laugh  _ earnestly like a child being tickled.

 

His new laugh was nice. Low and loud and bubbling up through his tears as they both dissolved back into giggles every time they looked at each other. A little bit hysterical. But that suited him, Bruce supposed.

 

When they finally calmed down, Jason scrubbed at his eyes again, sniffling. “I’m a fucking mess.”

 

“You should wash your face. I’d...like to take you somewhere, before dinner.”

 

Jason raised an eyebrow. “Where?”

 

“The mall, maybe? Somewhere with a Christmas store. I think...I think we have some ornament shopping to catch up on.”

 

_ Please be the right thing to say. _

 

Jason grinned.

\--

They picked out five ornaments, in the end. A motorcycle, a little stack of books, the Gotham skyline, a tiny pair of combat boots, and a pair of comedy and tragedy masks. 

 

It wasn’t until they were checking out that Bruce noticed Jason had added a small bat to the pile.

  
Maybe this  _ would  _ be the first of a new kind of Christmas.


End file.
